I have Paint.net, which is free an does basic editing at a much better level than MS paint. http://www.getpaint.net/What it does:It does good resizes, has an "auto-level" feature which works well sometimes, can adjust brightness/contrast and sharpness, and apply "artistic" effects. It's fairly basic but it does okay.

What I would like:Something that can do batch file management. For example: could rename all the files in the folder from "DSCN10645.jpg" to "sunlight_1.jpg" or whatever. Also do batch resizing.

I'm also curious to know how you manage your files?I have the full resolution files, unedited. I keep these in case I want to make a modified picture.I have lower resolution (usually 1280x960) files that I have touched up for use on 14ers.com and facebook, as well as e-mail.I sometimes have high resolution but modified photos that I keep for printing. How to keep this all organized?

The one bonus that I have is virtually unlimited storage. I have a 1.5 TB NAS that is raid 0 and has about 1 TB free right now.. so no worries there. I also have 3 different computers.. o.O

THE best utility for editing and organizing photos is Lightroom. It is incredible I could talk for hours about all of the ways it will blow your mind. It is seriously worth the $150 it generally costs.

Some of those samples of DNR from lightroom look amazing. I like my Camera (Nikon S8100) but the images it produces aren't real good. They need some help! I might just take the plunge and get lightroom.

Take the plunge. I've been using Lightroom since the beginning and have it organizing and managing well over 100,000 images now. Worth it in every way. There are some really good tutorials out there, from AdobeTV and others, and plenty of people like myself who are more than happy to answer questions.

if you are in school, or if you have a kid in a k-12 program, you can likely get lightroom for $100 bucks. check out journeyed, there are several other educational software sites out there too. you usually just need to email your kids report card or something saying they are enrolled to be verified and then you will be eligible for student pricing. i have a copy of lightroom 2.0 i picked up that way and it is the exact same product as the street version.

it isn't always that case, i have an educational copy of autodesk's autocad lt and there is a watermark when you print.

if you are good friends with someone that has a kid in school, or know someone going to grad school, yada, yada... you get the idea;-)

ps -- why on earth would you need to rename a file from random characters to bobby.jpg? even using picassa there is no need to ever rename, plus its an excellent file manager/photo adjustment software for free:-)

+1 for Picasa. Lightroom is better in every way except simplicity (and not being free). I can drastically improve 200 photos in an hour or two.

That said, I'm pretty sure if I took the time to learn Lightroom it would be just as fast. Problem for me is that if I have a bajillion controls in front of me to adjust the photo, I end up for hours on a single photo trying to achieve perfection.